There has been a conventional liquid processing apparatus for a substrate known to those skilled in the art, which processes a substrate (also referred to as a “wafer” in the following description), such as a semiconductor wafer, by supplying a processing liquid to the substrate. Such a conventional liquid processing apparatus includes a wafer holding part for holding one sheet of wafer in a substantially horizontal state, and a rotation driving part for rotating the wafer holding part around a vertically extending axis. Through the rotation of the wafer holding part by the rotation driving part, the wafer maintained in a substantially horizontal state by the wafer holding part rotates about a vertically extending axis. Further, a processing liquid supplying part for supplying a cleaning solution or a chemical to a front surface or back surface of the wafer held by the wafer holding part, is arranged in the liquid processing apparatus as described above. Therefore, by supplying a processing liquid to the wafer by the processing liquid supplying part while rotating the wafer, the liquid processing apparatus can perform the cleaning or the chemical processing of the wafer.
Further, in the conventional liquid processing apparatus, in order to prevent particles from being adhered to the surface of the wafer during the processing of the wafer, a gas, such as a clean air or an N2 gas, is supplied in a down flow to the surface of the wafer held by the wafer holding part, so as to suppress the adhesion of particles on the surface of the wafer.
Further, in the case of high temperature processing of the wafer, it is known to the skilled in the art that the processing liquid supplied to the wafer by the processing liquid supplying part is heated in advance. See, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2003-115474. When the processing liquid with a high temperature is supplied to the wafer by the processing liquid supplying part, the heat is transferred from the processing liquid to the wafer, so that the wafer is processed while being heated.